My baby boy is ONE!

Ben had a birthday a couple weeks ago. Unfortunately, the day before he threw up a few times and I didn't think giving him a cupcake would be the beeeest idea, so I decided to postpone those fantastic pictures and celebration and combine it with Mary's birthday party this year. I mean really...this is probably the only time in their life that I'll be able to do this, so I might as well take advantage of that.  We did however, have a wonderful dinner with my parents (to celebrate my Dad's bday too), Sian and the girls, and Dan at Longhorn Steak House. It was fun to all be together and have a nice dinner. Later that night, the bug that Ben had hit Tim and he was sick. Then a couple days later I was sick...and then my mom, Spencer, Owen, our neighbors downstairs it was vicious! Thankfully, although it took it's toll in setting people back a couple days, we are now all healthy again and enjoying life.

Here are some pictures of the birthday boy enjoying some bread and bananas. Cupcakes will come later. ;-)

Wow it's been a long time!

Last night I was looking back through the blog...it had literally been about a year since I had done that. The reason? A year ago I wasn't able to log in and I had two email addresses and forgot a password and blah bah blah, for some reason I couldn't sign in and I thought it was donezo. I don't know what I did, but I logged in and man I am so far behind and would really love to catch up. However, that will take FOREVER. So I'm just going to try my best and use this blog as a little family journal of sorts and see where it goes. There is my disclosure on the absence of posts. Now to begin again! Yay to New Beginnings! :-)

Exciting Family News: Baby Boy Coming in October!

Tim and I have been sitting on some really exciting news for a few months; we're pregnant!  The most exciting news so far is that we found out this past week that our baby is growing healthy and that he is a little BOY! That's right-we're having a BOY! And we couldn't be happier or more excited about it. His due date is October 11th but I'm pretty sure he'll probably be late like his sister.

We waited a while to tell everyone I was pregnant this time because we wanted to make sure everything was going well...and I was sick for a really long time with different bugs, including morning sickness, and its really no fun to see you so miserable all the time. Also, pregnancy seems to take forever, so by waiting longer to tell people it will at least go by faster for them. :-) We told our families earlier of course, but now the cat is out of the bag and we've announced it to the world (aka facebook and this blog).

The First Five Months:
Similar to Mary's pregnancy, my immune system was nonexistent the first couple months so I got really sick with a bunch of bugs: the flu, the stomach flu, a couple of viruses, colds.  Then at around 10 weeks my morning sickness really started to kick in. Some days it was all I could do to lay on the couch all day intermittent with changing Mary's diapers, getting her bottles, and getting us some food.  It was bad enough that there were multiple times when I was thankful for my food storage milk powder because I would run out of real milk and have to use that for Mary.  This lasted for a few weeks and then we discovered a miracle; Unisom and B-6 vitamins.  This little medical combo practically eliminated my nausea.  The trick was I had to take it at night before bed, but not too late otherwise I'd be too tired the next day.  There were a couple of times when I couldn't take it because it was too late and the next day I always threw up. It worked wonders though-no prescription and the unisom would help me sleep at night. I'm definitely going to be using this for future pregnancies. Other than that though, things have been really great. I can now feel this little guy moving around pretty often. I feel like his movements are bigger than Mary's were at this stage. Some days I feel more tired than I can remember being before, but I owe that too my little munchkin waking us up early and lots crazy dreams.

I'm so excited to know the gender now. After the ultra-sound Mary and I just sat in his room thinking of how we want to decorate it. Needless to say we have a lot of organizing and cleaning up to do.

Tim is a very excited and proud papa. He has taken such good care of me through my whole pregnancy. He has made late night trips to satisfy my cravings (Subway sandwiches this time) and been incredibly patient with my lack of cooking, cleaning, everything. I am reminded every day of how incredibly lucky I am to have been blessed with this man as my husband. He is THE BEST dad and husband. Always playing with Mary, never complaining, and just doing everything-and all after working a hard days work. He is really excited to be having a boy. I imagine father-son campouts in a few years and know he is just going to LOVE them!

Mary I think is going to be a really good big sister.  She loves babies and gets excited every time she sees one in real life, on tv, or in a picture. When we visit my sister she likes to give her baby cousin kisses and hand him his bottle. I'm hoping she'll be "helpful" with me too.

I feel so incredibly blessed and happy. We are so excited for this little boy to join our family and our so grateful for the help and support of our family. I'll admit, if it wasn't for my sister having two little boys within the last year I'm pretty sure I would be thoroughly overwhelmed and super nervous. But thankfully I feel a little more prepared because of our sweet nephews. So yep-we're having a boy and I'm over half-way done! WHOOHOO!

Mary in the Tub

This girl loves being in the bath. Admittedly she's had a few bonks from slipping, and therefore she is now very well behaved and usually stays on her bum. But she is fine getting water just dumped on her head (her mommy was a swim instructor and didn't want her to be uncomfortable with water on her face, so I never gave her another choice). She loves playing with her rings, and the rocketships, as well as her poor bucket. I think I need to get her some more bathtoys.  Here are some great pics and videos in the meantime. 

12 Months: Mary turned ONE!

Mary's birthday was on Saturday. My baby is officially a one year old toddler. It is amazing how fast this last year has gone by; it has been the best year of my life so far. We threw a little birthday party for her with family. I basically just wanted to have a get together so that I could see her eat cake. It didn't disappoint.  She had such a fun time with her cousins and aunts and uncles, Grandpa, Nanny, and face timed with Meema, and Granddad.  All of her cousins helped her out with opening her presents.

Mary Stats:

Height: 30 inches 80%

Weight: 17 lbs 6 oz 14%

Head: 17 inches 40%

Mary...

• walks around everywhere, although she has a little more trouble doing it with shoes or boots on
• Waves hi and goodbye to people and is very friendly
• Loves playing peekaboo/Where's Mary?
• Is very inquisitive and reserved in a new place and then the life of the party once she feels comfortable
• Still lacking in the hair department although she is getting more
• Her eyes are looking like they're blue/gray
• Hi is her favorite word, but she can also say yeah, uh-oh, mama, dada, daddy, and lift her arms up for touch down. 

Mary's First Halloween

Mary had a wonderful first Halloween.  We went to my sister's home and she loved being with her cousins. My sister lives in a really fun neighborhood and a bunch of her neighbors get together and have a potluck in the driveway, so I had a lot of fun too. And Nanny and Granddad were able to be here, so that was great!

For Halloween Mary was dressed up in two outfits.  For the day she was Minnie Mouse courtesy of my friend Katy M who gave her the cute outfit at Mary's baby shower. Coincidentally, Sophie was wearing a shirt that matched Mary's costume so she put on a pair of Minnie ears and they were twinners. 

Mary's second costume was this cute bumblebee borrowed from her cousins.  There's something about seeing a little baby in a fat suit, which this basically was...it was adorable.  Mary loved dancing and bouncing on her cousin Owen's bouncer and it was adorable to see her little bee bum going up and down.

Month 11

11 Months

• Really good at clapping
• Makes a stinker face where she scrunches her nose, puckers her lips, and lowers down her eyebrows
• Has taken a few steps. Her first two were towards Tim one day before she turned 11 months. The most she has taken so far is 7 in a row. 
• Sticks her tongue out to the side when she is concentrating really hard.
• Still only has the two teeth on the bottom, seems to act like she is teething all the time though, so more may appear any day now. 
• She can sign the word "more"
• Can almost climb up on the couch by herself and definitely can if she has something to stand on (like my leg)
• Can easily go up stairs but doesn't know how to go down them
• Likes to wave with both hands and with them above her head
• She can "shake her booty".  We'll sing "Shake, shake, shake. Shake, shake, shake. Shake your booty. Shake your booty." and she swings her hips to it. Kind of incredibly adorable. 
• When Daddy comes home from work she gets so excited and jumps up and down or crawls super fast and tries to burrow her face and then come out at him.